Irish republicanism

Irish republicanism is the belief that all of Ireland should become an independent republic. The ideology originated with the liberal United Irishmen during the 1780s, and Irish republicans launched failed rebellions against British rule in 1798, 1803, during the 1830s, 1848, 1867, during the 1880s, 1916, 1919-1921, and 1968-1998. Irish republicanism was advocated mostly by Catholic Irishmen, who were treated as second-class citizens by the Protestant Anglo-Irish and Ulster Scots, but many Irish republican leaders were of other origins: Wolfe Tone, the leader of the 1798 United Irishmen uprising, was a Protestant, as was major Irish republican parliament member Charles Stewart Parnell, and Eamon de Valera was an American-born politician of half-Cuban descent. Irish republicanism was represented by Sinn Fein and the Workers' Party of Ireland in politics and by the Irish Republican Army on the battlefield.